Four Hours to Kill!

Four Hours to Kill! is a 1935 American drama film directed by Mitchell Leisen and starring Richard Barthelmess.^[1]

Plot

Taft, a policeman, has fugitive murderer Tony Mako in custody and in handcuffs, two thousand miles from the prison from which Mako escaped. With four hours to kill, Taft takes his prisoner to a theater where the cop's wife, Mae, is a hostess.

Mae is an unfaithful schemer. She is trying to extort $200 from coat-check kid Eddie, insinuating she is pregnant. Eddie doesn't want his fiancee Helen to hear this, true or otherwise, so he tries to raise the money to pay Mae's blackmail. Eddie is also suspected of stealing an expensive piece of jewelry.

Mako made the journey this far in the hope of gaining revenge against Anderson, a man who informed on him. After telling Taft he would prefer a quick death to a painful execution, Mako breaks free and shoots Anderson before being shot by Taft, dying the kind of death he wanted. Eddie is cleared and now free to marry Helen, while Mae is taken away to jail.

Cast

• Richard Barthelmess as Tony Mako
• Joe Morrison as Eddie
• Gertrude Michael as Mrs. Sylvia Temple
• Helen Mack as Helen
• Dorothy Tree as Mae Danish
• Roscoe Karns as Johnson
• Ray Milland as Carl Barrett
• Charles C. Wilson as Taft
• Henry Travers as Mac Mason
• Noel Madison as Anderson
• Paul Harvey as Capt. Seaver
• Olive Tell as Mrs. Madison
• Lee Kohlmar as Pa Herman

Original play

The film was based on a play, Small Miracle, which ran for 119 performances with Joseph Calleia in the leading role.^[2]

It was Krasna's second play and he wrote it in the evenings while working as a Columbia Pictures contract writer during the day.^[3]

Proposed remake

In 1944 Paramount announced they would remake the film with Alan Ladd in the lead. However this did not eventuate.^[4]

References

External links

• Small Miracle at the Internet Broadway Database
• Four Hours to Kill! at the Internet Movie Database
• Four Hours to Kill at TCMDB